A Talk with Golda Meir

THE big guns of Israel and Egypt have been silent along the Suez Canal for more than a year now. Last week, as the cease-fire that has preserved a tense and tentative peace in the region moved into its second year, TIME Correspondent Marsh Clark talked to Israeli Premier Golda Meir in her Jerusalem office about the outlook for negotiations and the possibilities for a lasting peace. The interview preceded Defense Minister Moshe Dayan's call for Israel to consider itself the "established government" of the Arab territories occupied during the 1967 war. Premier Meir later dissociated herself from that suggestion, but nonetheless she showed little inclination to depart from Israel's tough-minded stance on the question of withdrawal without secure borders. Her comments provided a sharp reminder of how little progress has been made toward any lasting peace.

Q. Mrs. Meir, at this point in time, a year after the cease-fire went into effect, how do you assess the outlook for war or for peace?

A. The cease-fire in itself is something that we welcome. Anything that will do away with the shooting. But we hope that the other side will also come to appreciate the fact that it is better to continue the cease-fire than to re-introduce it after shooting begins again.

Q. Is the interim solution involving the reopening of the Suez Canal still alive, or are we flogging a dead horse?

A. As far as we are concerned it is alive. We, at any rate, are anxious for the negotiations to succeed.

Q. What would be the elements in such an arrangement?

A. The fundamental desire to have peace between Egypt and Israel is the main thing. The forces are there, and they are separated by a body of water, a very important separating element. Now, as for the idea that this exercise involves our moving from the canal, it doesn't make any difference how far (and it won't be too far). No sooner will we move than Egypt's armed forces will come over. It is so ridiculous--illogical. Instead of having a further separation of forces, they would be closer. -

Q. This is a main sticking point, the number and character of the Egyptians on the east bank of the canal?

A. Not the numbers, the very crossing of the canal by armed forces.

Q. What about civilians?

A. Of course we agree that those who are necessary to clear the canal and operate it can be there. No more shooting, though. That element is vital. There must be no military forces crossing the canal.

Q. Is that the major sticking point?

A. It is one. Another major one is no more shooting anywhere. Both of us have to declare that there will be no more shooting.

Q. But there hasn't been any shooting for the past year.

A. That is true, but we don't want to be served a new date every so often. What did [Egypt's President Anwar] Sadat do? He destroyed every constructive element in this proposition. First, he proposed that the Egyptian armed forces cross the canal immediately. Secondly, he gave us a cease-fire for six months. And during these six months he will clear the canal. During the six months, according to his recipe, [United Nations Mediator Gunnar] Jarring has to work out a timetable for our moving back up to the international border.

And if that isn't done, they begin shooting. Where do they begin shooting? Not when they are on one side of the canal and we are on the other, but when we are both on the same side. Or maybe Sadat will say the canal is not important, that what he wants is to get Israel back to the 1967 border. This is exactly the crux of the matter. If Israel decides to withdraw to the 1967 international border, we don't need to do it in stages. If we were to come to a decision we would pack and move to the international border. And he can have the canal cleared or not. We are not responsible for that. The question of where the border should be, the final border, is a question to be decided by negotiation between the parties. We have always said an "agreed border."

Q. You have just given a very pessimistic assessment. Do you think there is any expectation that something can be negotiated, interim or otherwise?

A. We don't want any more than this. We demand for ourselves boundaries that we believe are safe for us and that we believe can deter a next war. What we want are two things. If and when we are attacked, the borders should be such that we will have fewer casualties. Even more important, the borders should be such that every Arab leader who takes it into his mind to attack us will look at them and say, "Ah, that is difficult, maybe we won't do that." That is all.

Q. Somehow to the public eye, at least in the U.S., the impression is that Israel is intransigent.

A. Sure we are intransigent when we face a situation in which Sadat says "peace," but the condition for peace is no negotiations, and we go right back where we came from. There is something else that is absolutely immoral, because it never happened before in human history--the inadmissibility of acquisition of territory by force. How many around the table of the Security Council can really stand up and swear they have never done it, never without provocation of war, never held any other territory?

Q. In your view, do the turbulence in the Arab world and the apparent inconstancy of the Arab leadership constitute a barrier, mental or otherwise, to negotiations?

A. No. But I think they strengthen our conviction that we are obligated to do everything we can from a security point of view because we never know what is going to happen on the other side. I think the crux of the difficulties of peace in the Middle East is the introduction of an imperialistic power in this area. That is the Soviet Union. I honestly believe the '67 war would not have taken place had it not been for the Russians.

Q. Assistant Secretary of State Joe Sisco was here and presumably had thorough discussions with the government. Do you feel that the prospects for meaningful negotiations were enhanced by your discussions with him?

A. There is always something positive in discussions among friends. Even when there is disagreement. And from that point of view, we welcomed the discussions with Mr. Sisco, as we did those in May with Secretary Rogers, and we are anxious for these discussions to go on.

Q. You seem to grow stronger and thrive on responsibility. Will you stand for reelection?

A. If I stand for election again in 1973, I'll be 75 years old. A career doesn't begin at 75. I have had quite enough. My children have been here from Tel Aviv for three weeks in my house, and I haven't had one day with them. It is almost barbaric. I always say that anyone who wants to be Prime Minister in Israel deserves it.

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